1. Change Management
Final
High Performance Management
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2. High performance management
involves implementing a ‘bundle’ of HR
practices that are:
internally consistent
aligned with the organization’s business strategy.
2

3. Models of human resource management
1. The “hard” control approach
• involves reducing labour costs to improve
efficiency.
• Rooted in Theory X assumptions ‘People
dislike work and must be controlled and
directed to get them to put forward adequate
effort to achieve organisational goals’
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4. Models of human resource management
2. The “soft” commitment maximisation approach
• Rooted in Theory Y assumptions ‘People will
exercise self direction and self control in the
service of objectives to which they are
committed’
• It assumes that individuals can work hard and
smart without being controlled through
sanctions and other external pressures.
approach
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5. How commitment strategies work
HR practices affect performance by:
• improving employees’ knowledge and skills;
• motivating them to engage in discretionary
behaviours that draw on their knowledge and
skill;
• enabling motivated employees to engage in
discretionary behaviours and improve the way
they perform their jobs.
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6. 1. Practices that improve employee knowledge
and skill
•
•
•
•
•
Recruitment
Selection
Induction
Training
Other development activities (coaching, mentoring,
on-the-job learning, secondments, job rotation)
• Retention
• Attendance
• Information sharing
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7. 2. Practices that motivate employees to
engage in discretionary behaviours
•
•
•
•
•
•
Employment security
Redeployment and severance
Performance appraisal
Incentives
Internal promotion systems
Status distinctions
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8. 3. Practices that enable motivated employees
to engage in discretionary behaviours
•
•
•
•
•
Organization structures
Parallel and temporary structures
Job design
Locus of decision making.
Employee voice
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9. Other benefits from
management practices
high
performance
• Delegated responsibility eliminates the need
for many supervisory roles.
• High commitment reduces the costs associated
with an alienated workforce engaged in an
adversarial relationship with management.
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10. The alignment of HR management practices
• Many attempts to improve performance fail
because changes are introduced piecemeal and
are focused on particular practices such as
selection, compensation or training.
• For example, the potential benefits of training
may be wasted if jobs are not redesigned to give
workers the freedom to apply their new
knowledge and skills.
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11. Implementation
Successful implementation requires a mindset
which regards people as fundamentally
trustworthy, intelligent and motivated.
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12. Results from high performance management
systems are impressive
(see Pfeffer, J., 1998, The Human Equation:
Building Profits by Putting People First)
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13. Diagnosing the alignment of HR practices
This involves diagnosing the extent to which
HR practices are:
• Congruent with the organization’s business
strategy (external alignment)
• Aligned with each other (internal alignment)
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14. Diagnosing external alignment involves four steps:
1. Reviewing the organization’s strategy.
2. Identifying the critical behaviours and related
competencies that are required to achieve the
strategy.
3. Identifying practices that the organization uses
to manage people.
4. Assessing the alignment of each HR practice
with the competencies and behaviours required
to achieve the organization’s strategy.
(Does each practice support the availability and
application of critical competencies and
behaviours?)
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15. External alignment matrix
Critical competencies/behaviours required to
achieve the organization’s strategy
Practices that affect the:
Development of competencies
1
2
3
4
5
6
Recruitment
Selection
Induction
Training
Information sharing
Motivation to use competencies
Employment security
Performance appraisal
Incentives
Internal promotions
Status distinctions
Freedom to use competencies
Organization structures
Job design
Locus of decision making
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16. Diagnosing internal alignment involves
assessing the internal consistency of HR
management practices.
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17. Internal alignment matrix
Management practices
Practices that affect the:
1
Development of competencies
Recruitment
Selection
Induction
Training
Information sharing
Motivation to use competencies
Employment security
Performance appraisal
Incentives
Internal promotions
Status distinctions
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 10 11 12 13
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Freedom to use competencies
Organisation structures
Job design
Locus of decision making
11
12
13
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18. The introduction of a high performance strategy
at MD Foods
• Early 1990s were difficult times in dairy industry, many firms
went out of business.
• MD Foods responded by restructuring the business and investing
in new processing and packaging technology.
• The new technology was not operated efficiently because of
workforce inflexibilities.
• Demand for dairy products varied and peak periods involved
extensive overtime work. At other times employees operated
machinery inefficiently to guarantee overtime work.
• Supplementary payments were used to introduce new practices
leading to over 90 different rates of pay.
• Absenteeism was high
• State of industrial relations varied between plants.
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19. New HR practices
• Trade union business forum to improve IR climate
• Greater job security
• Annualised hours – fixed salary for agreed annual hours,
part roistered and part reserved.
• Team based self roistering
• New job grading structure that encouraged skill
development
• Increased holidays
• New pension plan
• Status distinctions reduced – everybody given ‘staff
status’; three sick pay schemes replaced by a single
scheme with improved benefits.
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